


a proud big brother

by BestDeadFriendsForever



Series: Accidents Happen [4]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Christopher gets into trouble at school, Eddie is a helicopter dad, I'm trans so Buck is too because I said so, M/M, Protective Eddie Diaz, Step-Dad Evan "Buck" Buckley, Trans Evan "Buck" Buckley, Trans Male Character, Trans Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24099313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BestDeadFriendsForever/pseuds/BestDeadFriendsForever
Summary: “Is Mr. Diaz home? This is Principal Summers from Durand, we’re calling about Christopher.” Buck’s heart kicked up in his chest and he shifted the phone to his other ear as he moved to grab socks so he could tug them and his boots on.“Mr. Diaz isn’t home right now but I’m Evan Buckley- Christopher’s alternate emergency contact. What’s going on?” Buck asked as he shoved his feet into his boots and hastily tied them as he cradled the phone between his cheek and his shoulder.“There has been a minor altercation between Christopher and another of his classmates and he’ll be needing to be picked up from school,” Principal Summers said calmly.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley & Carla Price, Evan "Buck" Buckley & Christopher Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz, Evan “Buck” Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Series: Accidents Happen [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1713259
Comments: 23
Kudos: 459





	a proud big brother

Buck scowled as he aimlessly wandered around the house. He’d had another blood test to check his iron levels and they still weren’t quite where Dr. Carter wanted them, so they’d adjusted his supplements again and Bobby had told Buck to take the day. Buck had already cleaned both the bathrooms in the house, tidied up his and Eddie’s bedroom, put away the dishes from the previous night, and done three loads of laundry: Chris’s school uniforms, Buck and Eddie’s work uniforms, and a load of miscellaneous other clothes that were currently in the dryer waiting to be folded and put away. It was safe to say that Buck was bored. So when the phone rang it was somewhat of a relief, until Buck heard who was on the other end of the line.

“Is Mr. Diaz home? This is Principal Summers from Durand, we’re calling about Christopher.” Buck’s heart kicked up in his chest and he shifted the phone to his other ear as he moved to grab socks so he could tug them and his boots on.

“Mr. Diaz isn’t home right now but I’m Evan Buckley- Christopher’s alternate emergency contact. What’s going on?” Buck asked as he shoved his feet into his boots and hastily tied them as he cradled the phone between his cheek and his shoulder.

“There has been a minor altercation between Christopher and another of his classmates and he’ll be needing to be picked up from school,” Principal Summers said calmly.

“Is he okay?” Buck asked and grabbed his keys and wallet from the table by the door.

“Christopher is perfectly fine, I assure you, Mr. Buckley. We can discuss this further when you arrive.” There was a pinched sort of tone to her voice and Buck thanked her before hanging up and heading out to his jeep. He sent Carla- who was at school with Christopher- a quick text but she simply responded that they would talk with Principal Summers together when Buck got there.

That didn’t bode well.

Buck parked as quickly as possible and despite the warmth of the day, he grabbed his LAFD hoodie and pulled it on to hide the small bump that had started to grow. It wasn’t noticeable, but it was enough to make him feel self-conscious when people’s stares obviously lingered. Once he was buzzed into the school he tugged the hoodie on and made his way into the office.

“How can I help you?” The secretary asked with a soft smile.

“Hi, uh, I’m Evan Buckley. Principal Summers called about my son, Christopher Diaz.” Buck tucked his hands into the front pocket of his hoodie and frowned a little when the secretary’s smile faded into a more stern look.

“Right this way, Mr. Buckley.” She led him into a side hallway where the vice principal, guidance counselor, and principal’s office were. Carla was standing outside the principal’s office with her arms crossed and Buck caught her eye and held up his hands in question.

“What’s going on?” Buck asked and Carla’s frown spoke volumes. “Where’s Chris? Is he alright?”

“ _He’s_ fine,” Carla said pointedly, her arms crossing across her chest. “He’s talking with Principal Summers right now. She said to knock when you got here so let’s go.” Carla knocked and they waited until Principal Summers called them in. Christopher was slumped down in the chair across the desk from the principal, his crutches propped up against the side of the armchair, and Buck moved to crouch beside Christopher.

“Hey, buddy,” Buck asked, a furrow between his brows. “What’s going on?” Buck asked and as he looked Christopher over, the boy looked fine. Not a scrape or bruise on him that Buck could see.

“Why don’t you sit down, Mr. Buckley,” the principal said and gestured to the chair next to Christopher’s. Buck nodded and sat, though he kept send wary looks between Christopher and Carla. “You know we have a very strict code of conduct for our school to make sure that every student feels safe and valued.” Principal Summers folded her hands in front of her on the desk. “Christopher had an argument with another student and instead of using his words decided to lash out physically.”

Buck’s eyes widened, hardly believing what he was hearing. Christopher was the sweetest, gentlest kid in the world and he could hardly imagine that Christopher would ever put his hands on anyone else. “What?” Buck asked, trying to get his head around it. He turned to look at Chris, who seemed to slump down further in his seat as if he wanted to floor to swallow him whole.

“Christopher, would you like to tell him what happened?” The principal prompted, the request obviously not a request at all.

Christopher fidgeted in his seat before taking a deep breath, his head never lifting from where his chin was tucked against his chest. “I brought pictures of the baby for Show and Tell,” Christopher started hesitantly. Buck nodded encouragingly despite knowing that Christopher’s eyes were firmly fixed on his shoes and the floor. Chris had been excited to go into his class and get to talk about his new baby sibling just like some of his classmates had when they’d been waiting for new brothers and sisters, and Buck was still relieved that none of the potential jealousy that all the parenting websites had warned him about was bothering Christopher. “I explained that you were the one having the baby and a couple people laughed.” Christopher lifted his head a little and Buck could see the frustrated expression on Christopher’s face. “They said that boys can’t have babies, but when I tried to tell everyone how you were a boy that _could_ have babies they wouldn’t listen.” Buck cringed a little, already seeing where this could be going, as Christopher shuffled his feet on the floor.

“Then what happened?” Carla prompted patiently and when Christopher looked at her with wide eyes, she gave him a stern look that told him he had better finish explaining himself.

Christopher scowled and then directed his gaze back down at his shoes. “At recess, Nathan and Bryce were making fun of you when they thought I couldn’t hear them.” Christopher glanced up at Buck for a moment before his gaze went back down to his shoes. “So, I-” Christopher bit his lip and Buck waited, but Christopher obviously wasn’t going to finish.

“He shoved one of the boys to the ground,” Principal Summers said. “Thankfully there were teachers nearby and that’s as far as it went, but you know that we can’t tolerate that kind of behavior.”

Buck took a breath and nodded. He had to be reasonable and not just take Christopher’s side because Christopher was his kid. “So how would you like to handle this?” Buck asked and tried not to fidget too much in his seat.

Principal Summers took a breath and fixed the top of Christopher’s head with a look. “Since this is a first offense and after talking to Christopher’s teachers and hearing how very uncharacteristic of him this is, I say that you take him home today and tomorrow he serve a one-day suspension.”

Christopher’s head whipped up and he looked at the principal with tears glistening in his eyes. From what Buck understood, he’d never been in trouble at school before so this had to be a full-body blow. “I can’t come to school tomorrow?” He asked and Buck winced a little at Christopher’s heartbroken tone.

“Chris,” Buck said firmly and tapped Christopher’s hand to get the boy to look at him. “You know what you did wasn’t right, so you’ve got to take responsibility. These are the consequences. Be glad you’re not in any more trouble.”

“But, Buck-!”

“No ‘buts’, Christopher,” Buck said softly but sternly. Christopher’s jaw worked silently and he nodded. “And we’re not done talking about this.” Buck knew that he and Eddie were going to have to sit Christopher down and have a long, hard talk about what happened. Eddie was going to be furious that he couldn’t be there, but Buck was glad that he wasn’t. Eddie would have been so defensive and protective of Christopher as well as Buck- making the situation so much worse. “Is there anything that I need to sign?” Buck asked, suddenly feeling drained.

The principal walked him through the disciplinary paperwork as Christopher and Carla went to collect Christopher’s things from his classroom. He folded his copy of the paperwork up and tucked it into his pocket for safe keeping.

“You haven’t contacted Mr. Diaz’s cell have you?” Buck asked and chewed his lip.

“Ms. Price told us that he was on call and most likely wouldn’t be able to be reached if we didn’t catch him on the house’s landline.” Buck nodded, feeling a little relieved that Eddie wouldn’t have this weighing on him for the rest of his shift. She gave him a look for a moment before sighing. “Though I cannot condone Christopher’s actions, I want to express my apologies to you, Mr. Buckley. The events that led up to this… situation should never have occurred in the first place and I will be talking to the other boys’ parents as well about their behavior.”

Buck gave her a tight smile. “Thank you.” Christopher shuffled in with Carla’s hand on his shoulder and Buck squatted down in front of him. “Do you have everything you need?” Buck asked and tapped at the side of Christopher’s leg.

“He has everything he needs for his homework and his teachers went ahead and gave him his work for tomorrow,” Carla said.

Buck nodded and patted Christopher’s shoulder. “Come on, kid. Let’s get you home.” Buck and Carla walked out with Christopher between them, obviously dragging his feet a little since he didn’t want to leave school.

Buck got Christopher buckled into the backseat of the jeep before closing the door and letting out a harsh sigh. “You need me to come and help you out, Buckaroo?” Carla asked and settled her hand on Buck’s arm. Buck shook his head as he swiped a hand over his face.

“No. Go ahead and go home. I should get him started on his homework and try to figure out what I’m going to tell Eddie.” He kept his voice low so that Christopher wouldn’t be able to hear him. He didn’t want Chris worried that Eddie was going to be mad at him. “Eddie’s going to lose it when he hears.”

Carla hummed and she gave Buck’s bicep a squeeze. “Call me if you need anything. Even if it’s help wrangling that man of yours.” Buck let out a short laugh and ducked his head to hide his smile.

“Thanks, Carla.” She went over to her car and Buck climbed into the jeep to start the drive home. Christopher- usually so excited and chatty whenever they were in the car- kept quiet and stared out his window the whole drive home. Buck decided to let him stew for a little bit while he tried to figure out what the hell he was going to say.

When they got home, Christopher tried to head to his room, but Buck stopped him. “Nope,” Buck said and stepped in front of him. “You’re going to sit in the dining room and work on your homework.” When Christopher opened his mouth to argue, Buck just frowned at him. Chris sighed and turned to go back to the table. He pulled out his folder for homework and slowly went about doing it.

Buck watched him for a while before leaving him to it so he could grab the clothes out of the dryer and fold them to stall for time. He sat on the couch, so he could keep an eye on Christopher while the boy did his homework, with the clothes and started folding.

He hadn’t really thought what anyone outside of their family was going to think about his pregnancy. He knew that it was not typical, and it’d been something that Eddie and Buck had had to sit down and have a longer conversation with Christopher about just so that they could address any questions that Christopher had about what was going to happen. But this, this blind-sided Buck completely.

He finished up with the clothes and looked over to where Christopher was flipping through his math book. He got up and wandered over to Christopher’s side. “How’s it coming?” Buck asked and watched how carefully Christopher looked up at him.

“It’s okay,” Chris said hesitantly with a shrug. Buck hated the way that Christopher was looking at him like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“Alright, kid,” Buck said softly and pulled out a chair to sit. “I think we need to have a little chat to clear some things up. Come here.” Buck patted his knee and Christopher got off his chair to pull himself- with Buck’s help- into Buck’s lap. “I’m not angry with you, okay?” He pressed a kiss to the side of Christopher’s head and wrapped his arms around Chris so that Christopher could sit sideways in his lap and they could see each other.

“You’re not?”

“No, buddy. I don’t think you should have pushed your classmate either,” Buck said sternly. Christopher ducked his head and Buck gave him a second to hide before he gently tilted Chris’s chin up so that they were looking each other in the eye. “Why did you let them get to you? Huh?”

Christopher’s eyes flicked between Buck’s and his face crumpled a little bit. “I don’t know. I just heard what they were saying, and I just got so mad-” Christopher’s breathing shook a little and he swiped at his eyes with a hint of embarrassment etched into his face. “I-I just wanted them to stop. They don’t know what they’re talking about.”

Buck rubbed Christopher’s back and he pressed his lips into a firm line. Even though he and Eddie had been co-parenting Christopher since before Eddie and Buck even started dating, he always felt a little wrong-footed in situations like this. He never felt like he knew what to say. “No, they didn’t,” Buck said, and he tapped his finger against Christopher’s shoulder blade. “But did shoving them change their minds?”

“What?” Christopher blinked at Buck for a moment before he shook his head. “No, I guess not.”

“And did it make you feel any better?”

“No,” Christopher sighed heavily and leaned into Buck’s chest, his curls getting into Buck’s face before Buck ran his fingers through Chris’s hair. “I…” Christopher sighed as he tried to think- he was so much like Eddie sometimes that Buck couldn’t help but feel a small smile tugging at his mouth despite the seriousness of the situation. “I should probably apologize shouldn’t I?”

“I think that would be very grown-up of you,” Buck offered.

They lapsed into a silence before Christopher plucked at the strings of Buck’s hoodie nervously. “Dad’s going to be upset, isn’t he?”

“Yeah, he is. But I don’t think he’s going to be upset with you.” Buck shifted his shoulder so that they were looking at each other again. “Why don’t you finish up your homework and then you work on those apologies while we wait for your dad to get home.” Christopher nodded and Buck steadied him as Chris slid off his lap and went back to his chair.

…..

Buck had let Christopher go to his room to write the apology notes that he planned to give to his teachers and the two boys from his class, so when Eddie walked in, Buck was in the kitchen alone.

“Hey,” Buck said and gave Eddie a smile as Eddie toed off his boots and tossed his keys and wallet onto the table by the door. He nodded to their bedroom and Eddie frowned slightly before making his way over. Buck took a deep breath- bracing for the fight that was sure to happen- before following him inside and closing the door.

“What’s up?” Eddie asked as he dropped his work bag and moved to the bed so he could sit down.

“I got a call from Christopher’s school today,” Buck said and quickly pushed on before Eddie could start to worry. “He got suspended.”

“What?” Eddie asked sharply and stood. “What for?”

“He pushed another kid, Eddie,” Buck said and when Eddie went to leave the room, he put a firm hand against Eddie’s chest and blocked him from leaving. “Listen to me before you go all helicopter dad,” Buck said firmly and gently pushed Eddie back towards the bed. “It was about his Show and Tell presentation. Some boys in his class were just being little shits and talking about me on the playground and Christopher got a little too protective. Wonder where he got that from.” Buck gave Eddie a pointed look and Eddie scowled at him.

“He’s okay?” Eddie demanded and Buck swiped his thumb over Eddie’s collarbone soothingly.

“Perfectly fine. The teachers stepped in the second that Christopher shoved the other kid.”

“What about the other kids?” Eddie asked.

“What do you mean?” Buck asked.

“Are they in trouble?”

“Eddie-” Buck started with a pained expression on his face. There was no way that Eddie was going to just let this go and have a talk with Christopher.

“No, Buck. They shouldn’t have been running their mouths like that.”

“They’re nine years old, Eddie. They’re probably just repeating something they overheard their parents say without have any idea what it means,” Buck said and shook his head. It wasn’t really an excuse, but Eddie looked about ready to go and shove those kids down himself. “I don’t even know _what_ they said. Christopher wouldn’t repeat it.”

Eddie’s jaw twitched and Buck cradled Eddie’s face between his hands tenderly. “ _Cariño, relájate_ ,” Buck soothed in Spanish softly as he swiped his thumb over Eddie’s cheekbone. The tension in Eddie’s shoulders eased up a little. “It’s okay.”

That was the wrong thing to say because Eddie was looking furious again the second the words came out of Buck’s mouth. “No, it isn’t! Christopher shouldn’t have to hear stuff like that at school! That stupid school shouldn’t-”

“Eddie!” Buck snapped, exhausted and wanting to catch and hold his boyfriend’s attention. “Those kids were talking about _me_. And I’m not nearly as upset about this as you are right now. This isn’t about you, okay? It’s about Christopher. Christopher was wrong to do what he did. Period. He realizes that so why can’t you?”

Eddie pulled away from Buck’s touch and shot him a wounded look. “Where is he?” Eddie asked with a look resembling a kicked puppy.

“He’s in his room writing apology letters, which you aren’t going to interrupt.” Buck raked a hand through his hair and let his eyes fall closed. “Get cleaned up. I’m going to finish making dinner.” Buck turned to head out of their bedroom, but Eddie caught his wrist and tugged him close.

“I’m sorry,” Eddie said and kissed the corner of Buck’s mouth. Buck nodded and gave him a brief kiss back.

“I understand that you’re protective of him, of me,” Buck said and pressed their foreheads together for a second before pulling away. “It’s what makes you an amazing dad- which is something that I love about you- but, Eddie, you have got to calm down. You can’t go storming in and biting everyone’s heads off because you don’t like what they said.”

“I’ll work on it,” Eddie said and lifted Buck’s hand up to press a kiss to it.

“Alright. Let’s just enjoy a nice night in with our awesome kid,” Buck said and gave Eddie’s hand a squeeze before dropping it.

“Yeah. I’ll be out in a minute.” Eddie said and moved to their bathroom so that he could clean up a little bit.

Buck went back out to the kitchen and found Christopher already out there and gathering up silverware to put on the table. “Is Dad really mad?” Christopher asked quietly as Buck pulled plates down and set them on the table.

“No, buddy. He’s upset that you had to hear your classmates being mean, but he’s not upset with you. Promise.” Buck leaned down and pressed a quick kiss to the top of Chris’s head. Chris settled the silverware thoughtfully before nodding.

After dinner, Eddie had a short conversation with Christopher about what had happened, but it was really more to touch base with their boy than to reprimand him. They got Christopher ready for bed, an early bedtime being the only part of his at-home punishment, and settled onto the couch to watch a movie. Both of them were tired- Eddie from his long shift and Buck just because of his stupid anemia- so it was more of them cuddling together and dozing than actually watching anything.

Buck let out a soft chuckle as he thought about the events of the day. “What?” Eddie asked sleepily and Buck couldn’t help but laugh a little more, turning his face into Eddie’s chest to muffle it. “What is it, Buck?”

“It’s just-” Buck snorted and shook his head. “He’s so much like _you_.”

Eddie took a moment to catch up, and when he put together what Buck was saying he opened his mouth to protest before closing it- not having said a word. “I dread the day he becomes a teenager then.” Buck just grinned brighter and patted Eddie’s chest consolingly. “Can’t he just stay little forever?”

“I don’t think so,” Buck said and he pressed a placating kiss to Eddie’s shoulder. “Besides, I’m sure he won’t be that bad.” There was a pause before Buck grimaced and pulled back to look Eddie in the face. “I want a divorce.”

Eddie laughed brightly. “We’re not even married.”

“Doesn’t matter. I can’t deal with two helpings of Diaz sass.” Eddie just laughed some more, the asshole.

**Author's Note:**

> So there's some more protective Eddie for y'all with a dash of protective Christopher as well :) Writing Christopher and Buck's relationship always warms my heart and I really wanted to have at least one installment focus on- primarily- just the two of them  
> -James


End file.
